a memory from the fifth of december, 20XX
by dimensionalscreaming
Summary: It was a bad memory. It felt like he was cursed. (For it was only later that he came to realize he was not cursed, but blessed.) [komaeda-centric]


It was morning in Room 212, and the mother and father were not there. Both of them were going to die, but they were not dead yet.

The mother had left long before anyone else was awake. At 5:00 sharp, she had risen to pack. She stuffed all her books and folders into their proper places, loaded all those bags onto a luggage cart, and brought her luggage to the parking lot. She minded it with nearly more care than she would her own son, and if you asked her about it all, she would rather proudly declare that this was incredibly important research. To be objective, this was incredibly important research, and she considered herself a rather important woman for it. She held a doctorate in the field of Evolutionary Biology from the prestigious University of Tokyo, and had been given a grant from said university to pursue a one-year inquiry on the Galapagos Islands, on a small team consisting of her husband and four others. And with that year behind her, she would be just as proud to tell you that her inquiry was as successful as her life in general.

The father wasn't in the parking lot yet, and he had said he would be by now. The mother was not happy. She was fuming to herself about how long getting some gas could possibly take as the minutes approached nearly a half-hour late. There was one plane, and the idea of missing it only frustrated her further. And she had not even woken her son yet.

At around six, morning in Room 212, the boy had woken up on his own to the glare of sunlight. He had fallen asleep reading a book, and he sighed as he realized he had lost his place in it now. The room was quiet, but that was normal. He spent most days alone. Some days he felt like he was cursed and seemed to break everything he touched, so he could assume it was for the best. There were no other children on the island, but back home he didn't have any friends either. The parents were usually out somewhere else, but when they were there, they would only be busy with their work and hush him for any disturbance he made. He just figured nobody should have to be around such a horrible, useless child, and so when people were around him he felt bad for them. He took interest in the parents' work, though, and sometimes he liked to read all the books they had. But not when they needed to read them, of course. He respected his parents and their important research.

He wished he could be important like them.

The mother had just opened the door, and breathed a sigh of relief to see the boy eating his cereal already. Get your bag, put on your shoes, and get in the car, she told him.

A nod. Is Dad even here yet? The boy was looking out the window and did not see the car. He knew he was not very observant, though, and he could have easily missed it.

No, but we'll be late if we don't get down there to jump in right when he is. I had to leave my research there, too. Come on.

What about my schoolwork?

The trip's long enough you can do it in the car and the plane.

I never do it good enough anyways . . .

You still have to.

The father was there when they got down to the parking lot. They got in the car and started driving. They were probably speeding to get to the airport in time, but so few people drove on the roads anyways. The first ten minutes the car was filled with the sound of arguing, but it eventually went silent and the boy could work. When he finished a bit of schoolwork, he felt carsick, so he stared out the window for a while and daydreamed. Eventually he felt good enough to read some manga for the rest of the car ride. He would have time for schoolwork on the plane too, but he was careful to read his book discreetly so the parents would not know. He did not want them to get mad at him.

The boy thought the airport was very boring and did not know why it was taking so long for the plane to take off. Eventually, it did. He was less scared of the takeoff than last year when he came here. The plane was small. In the seats sat the mother, the father, the boy, and only five or six others. The parents sat beside each other, and the boy did not have to sit next to anybody. He did the rest of his schoolwork, and there were still many hours to spare. He was bored, but he had been more bored than this. The flight attendant had coloring books. He was a little old for coloring books, but it was something to do. The mother and father mostly slept, and the boy did not understand how easily they could fall asleep. They were tired, he assumed, and had done a lot of important work.

This was when the man with the gun stood up and put his weapon against the pilot's head. He was saying something, but the boy only knew Japanese and some very basic English. The man's shouting woke the parents. They were very frightened.

They turned to each other and whispered something he could understand. This kid really is cursed, isn't he!

We should've left him sleeping in the hotel. Maybe then we wouldn't be fucking dying!

From across the aisle, the boy shrunk in his seat and hoped that neither the man with the gun nor the parents would pay him any attention.

The man with the gun was still shouting something at the pilot. The pilot was doing something with the controls. The boy started to cry just a little. The parents were praying. Then the man with the gun turned around. He was still yelling at the pilot as he held the gun to the mother's head. The boy hid his face in his lap.

So much happened in the span during which the boy's head was hidden in his lap.

A loud popping noise rang out, and then a scream from the father. The man's gun whispered out smoke from its tip. The mother was dead. The boy did not see, but he knew. His heart was beating out of his chest, and he wanted to pray too. He hoped it was just a nightmare. It was not a nightmare.

Glass broke and the billowing sound of the open sky filled the plane. He could hear the screams of two men, the man with the gun and the father. The boy had not looked up yet. He feared flying out of his seat. If he had looked up he would have seen three corpses, a fallen gun, and a meteorite.

. . . And then further crashing noises, howling wind, the feeling of falling, a turbulent thud which nearly sent the boy flying forward . . .

The boy thought it was ludicrous that he had survived the plane crashing into a parking lot on the outskirts of Tokyo. This was because everyone else on the plane was dead.

* * *

The boy did not know how long he spent in his seat, surrounded by corpses. The smell of blood mingled with that of jet fuel. To him, it hardly felt real at all. His mind was blank; his body was nearly as still as the unbreathing husks around him. His parents were dead. If they were not dead, they would be furious. He still wished they were around, even just to say, cursed, disgusting, stupid, worthless child. You went and fucked everything up again.

He said it to himself, so something was not missing.


End file.
